Social networks can accumulate substantial amounts of data. Such data can include, for example, information relating to user interaction, content posted by members, general behavioral information of users, and performance parameters regarding subsystems that support the social network. Of course, other types of data may be generated or collected by the social network. Because a large portion of humanity enjoys some connection to social networks, the amount of data managed by social networks is substantial.
The data managed by a social network can be used for many purposes. For example, the social network may analyze the data to assess the performance and operation of the social network. As another example, the social network may perform analytics on data maintained by it to better understand the nature of its users or their behavior. To analyze all of the data managed by a social network may pose significant computing challenges and costs. In view of the large volume of data, operations performed by the social network may be facilitated by reliance not on the entire volume of managed data but rather on samples thereof.